Lucas Hires Ridley to Tell Red Tails

Variety reports that Star Wars creator George Lucas has hired screenwriter John Ridley to pen the script for Red Tails, Lucas’ WWII action adventure about the Tuskegee Airmen to be financed and produced through Lucasfilm.

The film is about a group of African-American fighter pilots who had to overcome racism and the color barrier to become the Tuskegee Airmen, the legendary first African-American pilots in U.S. military history. (The planes were distinguished by their red-painted tails, hence the title.)

According to the Variety story, Lucas hired Ridley after reading L.A. Riots, the Universal/Imagine drama Ridley wrote for director Spike Lee, and Ridley has already met some of the surviving pilots at a Texas convention.

ILM will be handling the effects to make the airborne fight sequences more realistic.